My Life and Travels
Here are more pictures of Brian’s balloon flight. Don Clapp took these pictures while we were setting up the balloon.
Brian’s Flight:
Landing site:
Pictures of setting up the balloon and leaving earth.
The balloon got up today, light winds moving towards the northwest.
Bruce splashed the balloon in the Rio Grande twice and then the wind changed to the north and he landed in the reservation. The tribal police were very nice however they will not let any travel off the main highway without an individual escort.
Today’s flight, the blue dot is where we are camped, just north is the launch field, red pin is where Bruce landed.
Where he landed.
Bruce and John were able to move the balloon to this point before the wind came up and they had to let the envelope down. The chase team was not allowed to step off the main road ( highway 313) until given permission which was after the envelope was down and folded up by Bruce and John.
We had to carry the envelope and the basket to this point next to the highway.
Here is where the balloon landed, GPS coordinates.
Denise took this picture as we were driving over the railroad tracks.
It was a fun day.
The balloon flew again today.
This is picture of Bruce’s balloon I got from the internet.
I don’t know where it was taken. Working on the crew does not give me a lot of time to take pictures of the balloon.
The flight was from the north end of the launch field, southeast, north, south over the museum ( first landing target), northwest to mid launch field, south to land due west of the museum by a quarter mile. Chase Crew got to the balloon three minutes after Bruce touched down, another chase crew caught him and helped us bring the envelope down. A beautiful morning.
Brian got to ride in a hot air balloon today, ZROZRO7 pilot Bruce Skach from Wichita,KS.
We have been crewing on Bruce’s balloon all week and we have sure learned a lot about ballooning. This is Brian’s “I’m going to fly where in what?”, look.
It is truly an honor to fly in a balloon you just got to help lay out, inflate and now get off the ground.
Morning balloon crewing.
I got to work on the crown line again today. Their was no wind on the field however at 1000 feet above the grass the wind was blowing 15 to 20 mpg. The field did fill up with balloons tethered to chase vehicles.
We all took turns in the basket with Bruce and someone would lay on the ground and take a picture or five. It was a fun morning.
Brian and Christine got here yesterday and will be here until Tuesday afternoon.
Today was balloon crew training morning. I was out the door at 6:00 a.m. going to an elementary school 10 miles from here. We went through the process of inflating a balloon and then taking it down so it is ready for the next day. The pilot we worked with is a really really nice guy providing us with lots of how to information and answering all our questions. He did not fly today because we were on the east side of the valley and the wind was blowing east. He needed to get a sponsor banner attached to his balloon and it would be a lot easier in the school’s grass field rather than some other field where ever he was able to land.
This is a picture of his balloon trading card, I took a couple of pictures of the balloon but I am to lazy to get out the computer and download the pictures.
Back of the card.
pictures looking halfway across the park
today
Tuesday
Looking forward to a great Fiesta, Brian and Christine get here tomorrow.
We are here for 14 days.
Today’s drive:
Campsite pictures.
Out the front window.
Aerials from InReach GPS.
This is an old dump which is used for RV parking during the Fiesta.
The red circle is around the balloon launch field and the yellow circle is the balloon museum where we are having dinner next Thursday the night they light up the special shapes balloons.
I spent six hours on Friday updating the blog. I had data on two cameras, Ipad and laptop to get all lined up and posted. Ended up using 4 gigs of data to get everything moved around and the posts written and posted for September 16 to 27, 2018.
Today I cleaned and waxed the bottom the the rear slide. The slide rides on a piece of plastic and it is important to keep the bottom of the slide nice and slick. I actually had not done this for a while.
Also, use CLR to clean all the calcium deposits off the water hose quick connect. It was getting to the point the connection were not so quick.
We moved here waiting for the Balloon Fiesta to start next week. We will move to Albuquerque on Tuesday October 2nd it is about 50 miles. We stayed here for a couple of days after the 2016 fiesta and it seemed like a good place to be before Albuquerque. The way the fiesta RV area is set up once you get there you cannot move so it is a good idea to arrive with empty black and gray tanks and full of propane and water. This park has water and a dumps site.
I’ll add campsite pictures from Ipad. Site 43.
Chaco Canyon is one of the largest sites in the southwest built between 850 to 1150. It a really cool place.
Amazing in size there are 600 rooms and 5 stories high.
The drive takes a while, at least if you don’t want to beat your vehicle to death. The last 4.5 miles of a 16 mile gravel road is wash board. The peaks are 9 to 12 inches across and the valley’s are 3/4 to 1.5 inches deep. It took us long time to go the 4.5 miles. You can go a lot faster but you’ll sure pay for it in the long run.
